“I was certain I'd hear that from you! I never yet knew a fellow do a stingy thing, that he had n't a shabbier reason to sustain it.”
“Come, come, there's no need of this. You can say no to my offer without a rudeness to myself.”
“Ay, that's all true, if one only had temper for it, but I have n't; and I have my doubts that even you would if you were to be tried as sorely as I am.”
“I never do get angry; a man shows his hand when he loses his temper, and the fellow who keeps cool can always look at the other's cards.”
“Wise precepts, and worth coming out here to listen to,” said Sewell, whose thoughts were evidently directed elsewhere. “I take your offer; I only make one condition,—you keep the negotiation a secret, or only impart it where it will be kept secret.”
“I think that's all fair. I agree to that. Now for the document”
“There it is,” said Sewell, as he threw the packet on the table, while he seated himself in a deep chair, and crossed his arms on his chest.
Balfour opened the paper and began to read, but soon burst forth with—“How like him—how like him!—'Less oppressed, indeed, by years than sustained by the conscious sense of long services to the State.' I think I hear him declaiming it.
“This is not bad: 'While at times afflicted by the thought, that to the great principles of the law, of which I had made this Court the temple and the sanctuary, there will now succeed the vague decisions and imperfect judgments of less learned expositors of justice, I am comforted by remembering that I leave behind me some records worthy of memory,—traditions that will not easily die.'”
“That's the modest note; hear him when he sounds the indignant chord,” said Sewell.